


The Place Where Headstones Have No Names

by pinstripedJackalope



Series: Ghost Stories (in a Shadowhunter World) [1]
Category: The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue Series - Mackenzi Lee, The Infernal Devices Series - Cassandra Clare
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ghosts, Character Turned Into a Ghost, Ghost Monty, Ghost Percy, Ghosts, I don't know how to tag that, It's canon compliant for TID, Like in the ghost sense, M/M, Magnus shows up for two seconds, Monty and Percy are ghosts in the shadowhunter universe okay, Moving On, Pining, Sick Jem Carstairs, Will is Will, Will thinks about Tessa a lot, but definitely not canon compliant for TGGTVAV, that's the premise
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-20
Updated: 2019-12-20
Packaged: 2021-02-26 15:53:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21870736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pinstripedJackalope/pseuds/pinstripedJackalope
Summary: Will set right to conducting his business, haggling for the candles he needed for Magnus and ignoring all the calls from the rest of the ghosts.  He could still hear them, however, as he traded rings for candles and started to walk away from the cemetery.  One voice seemed to rise above the others, and try as he might, Will could not block it out as it said, “Have you ever loved someone?  Have you ever felt like your entire being was on fire when they were near, and that you burned down to cold ash when they were away?”Will shivered, feeling the ghost’s eyes lingering on his back.  He tried desperately to keep moving, to just walk away, one foot in front of the other, but the ghost wasn’t done.  “Please.Please.  I’ve been looking so hard.  I’m socold.”
Relationships: Henry "Monty" Montague/Percy Newton, Jem Carstairs & Will Herondale
Series: Ghost Stories (in a Shadowhunter World) [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1579357
Comments: 8
Kudos: 37





	The Place Where Headstones Have No Names

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this all in one day, god help me.
> 
> I tried to make this fic as easy to read as possible! You should still be able to read it if you haven't read one book or the other! Also, there is a list of shadowhunter terms in the endnotes of this fic just in case you need them.

Will is sure of many things in life. Gin is better than whiskey, The Devil Tavern is a lonesome place despite all its boisterous noise, London is only pretty at night, when the dim skies hide the muck and grime… those sorts of things. He’s also sure that he’ll remember this night for the rest of his life. And not just because of the remembrance rune carved just below his left collar bone. 

He breathes deeply, staring up into the great, vast depths of the stars just outside his window. 

No… that isn’t the only reason.

It all started a week before, on a night very similar to this, one with a bloodless moon and a wicked chill in the air. It started with Magnus Bane and a bag of jangling wedding rings.

***

“You want me to do what, exactly?”

Magnus had on an expression that Will had seen about a hundred times too many since he’d come to the warlock for help. Mild amusement contained in the quirk of the lips, laid overtop a great deal of boredom. Magnus, all slow-blinking cat eyes and rich brown skin, held out the bag more insistently, rattling it. “Ichor candles, dear William. Fetch them. I’ve given you the instructions already—or would you rather wait until I can get out to visit Old Molly myself?”

No. No, he really would not. Every false-start and every moment spent waiting was a moment longer that Will had to force himself to stay away from Tessa. He needed this curse broken—he needed it _now_. Like the fields needed rain, like his lungs needed air, he needed it. With a sour expression he snatched the bag, metal rings clattering inside, and set off to run the warlock’s errand. 

He’d never liked passing near the cemetery of outcast souls, let alone walking straight up to its wrought-iron gates. The cries of the forgotten weren’t pleasant, not for those who could hear them—they were loud, and annoying, and they drilled into Will’s head whenever he got close, like worms eating their way to the center of an apple. Still, he had a job to do, and a shadowhunter doesn’t back down. No matter how annoying ghosts are.

“Have you seen Percy?”

Take this one, for instance. The needling voice was just one of a dozen crowding up against the other side of the gate. It wasn’t as pushy as some, Will admitted, but it was still demanding, single-minded, as it asked again, “Percy? Have you seen him?”

Will raised his witchlight in his hand, coming up to the gate and ignoring the pleading voice as best he could. Still, his proximity to the gate was like an invitation, for the ghost shimmered into existence in the corner of Will’s eye.

“I can’t find him. I’ve been looking so hard.” It floated closer, still not much more than a haze. “Can you help me?”

Will, against his better judgment, glanced over once at the question. He couldn’t make much out much—just a vague shape. It was a man, he thought—shorter than him by a good few inches. A man… but a young one, he realized, as the voice called again. 

“Please, can you help me?” it asked, and stepped forward once more.

He was handsome, Will thought, though in a creepy way. His golden hair was shorn short, breeches and shirt riddled with holes, his face long and beseeching. He caught Will’s eye and one corner of his mouth curved up into a smile, a dimple carved into the flesh of his cheek. The bones of his skull shined through from underneath.

Will tried not to shudder, turning away again. “I’ve got my own shit to deal with,” he snapped. Then he raised his voice, calling, “Molly! Old Molly!”

The ghost didn’t back away, persistent. “Please. I can’t find him,” he said, and Will clenched his teeth. He refused to look back at the spirit. Instead he shook his head, biting down on the inside of his cheek, and said, “I said _no_.”

“Please—”

“Old Molly! I’m done playing! Come out and speak to me or I’ll walk away with this bag of rings!”

“A charming lad, ain’chu?” said a new voice, rising from the cursed ground just on the other side of the gate. The other ghosts fell away, backing up as if in respect as another ghost began to coalesce, swirling up in a vortex from the dirt itself. 

Molly. Thank the angel.

Will set right to conducting his business, haggling for the candles he needed for Magnus and ignoring all the calls from the rest of the ghosts. He could still hear them, however, as he traded rings for candles and started to walk away from the cemetery. One voice seemed to rise above the others, and try as he might, Will could not block it out as it said, “Have you ever loved someone? Have you ever felt like your entire being was on fire when they were near, and that you burned down to cold ash when they were away?”

Will shivered, feeling the ghost’s eyes lingering on his back. He tried desperately to keep moving, to just walk away, one foot in front of the other, but the ghost wasn’t done. “Please. _Please_. I’ve been looking so hard. I’m so _cold_.”

Without his consent, Will found his feet slowing until he’d stopped in the middle of the pathway leading back to the street. He closed his eyes, wincing as a memory rose—a memory of Tessa, and an attic, her heat burning so bright against him that he felt like it had lit his heart from the inside out. And then, of course, followed the memory of her walking away, slamming the door behind her, and he felt the heat seep from his heart down to his fingers and to the air all around him until he was chilled to the bone.

He knew what it felt like to love someone. He knew what it felt like to lose them. He knew. A sick feeling rose inside him at the idea of languishing for eternity separated from the person he loved most, and before he knew it he was swiveling on his heel and marching right back to the gate and the ghost pressed up against it. He shoved his finger in the ghost’s face, snarling, “ _Fine_. I’ll do it. Just this once, you understand?”

The ghost didn’t say another word. Instead he smiled—a delightful, dimpled smile, charming if not for the glimmer of bones underneath.

***

It took but a moment to scale the tall iron fence, shadowhunter agility guiding Will over the spiked top with nary a scratch. He landed on his feet, raising his witchlight and pushing through the throngs of ghosts. “Out of my way,” he said to them, brandishing the witchlight threateningly at the more forward ones, the ones that reached out to claw at his coat and boots as they wailed. The witchlight didn’t hurt them, but it was bright enough to scare them back into the shadows for fear of disappearing. 

“This way,” said the ghost of the man, drifting silently through the headstones. Will, despite his disgust at the dead as they swarmed around him, stepped carefully around each grave. “I’m Henry Montague, by the way. Call me Monty. I hate the name Henry.”

That last bit was almost muttered, the ghost—Monty—shaking his head. He couldn’t have been much older than Will—nineteen? Twenty, maybe? It was hard to tell. Will bit his lip, hurrying along as the ghost drifted with purpose to the far end of the cemetery.

“Here,” he said, coming to rest beside a pair of headstones. “This is mine, and this… this is Percy’s.”

“If you know where he is, then why did you bring me in here?” Will snapped, wrinkling his nose. He swept his black hair off his forehead, rolling his eyes back. Lord help him.

“It’s empty. The grave, I mean. It’s got his bones but he’s not… he’s not here.”

“Are you absolutely sure this is the right grave?” Will asked, leaning down to see. The stone was old, certainly old enough to match the style of clothing that Monty wore, a style that a few of de Quincy’s vampires had worn. The writing on the stone, unfortunately, was worn down—he couldn’t read the name or the dates upon it at all. It must have been cheap, soft stone to have weathered so much in a mere hundred years. Or maybe the stone, like the people here, had been forgotten, never tended. Nothing erodes faster than that which has been forgotten.

Will sat back on his heels, looking around the graveyard. “Maybe he’s somewhere else?” he asked at long last. 

“I’ve searched. I’ve never found him.”

Will grunted, climbing back to his feet. He was regretting this very much, the ichor candles thunking together in his knapsack every time he moved. He wanted desperately to get them back to Magnus, to get on with the demon summoning already, but here he was, scrounging through graveyard mud for the traces of an eighteenth century man as spirits wailed all around him, vying for his attention.

“Why were you outcast, anyway?” he asked, hoping to distract from the other spirits.

The ghost at his side laughed. Will shivered—it was an ugly sound, like the sound of bone grinding against bone. The mirth didn’t reach his eyes.

“I was once a Lord, Viscount of Disley. I know, I know—I hardly look it. But it’s true. My father, the Duke of Disley, gave me an ultimatum—stand up straight, uphold the honor of the peerage, or disappear.”

“So you disappeared?”

“It took me a while. I was on Tour through Europe and stole a puzzle box from Versailles. Started a massive manhunt, these foul men chasing us all across the continent as we tried to fix what I’d broken—my sister, Percy, and me, that was. We came to the end of our journey and I had the choice to go back to my father or to run away with Percy and I… I chose to run.”

Will glanced over. The ghost was staring up at the sky, all the clouds and the stars and moon and the vast, velvety blackness behind it all. “…How did you die, then?” he asked, when it became clear that the ghost was lost in memory.

“Well,” Monty said, coming back to himself. “The running away… it was wonderful because we had each other, but terrible at the same time because we had _nothing but each other_. For the first time in our lives we were alone, without servants, without money, without anything. And we were careful. We had to be. Careful with our love, I mean.”

Will felt ghostly eyes turn to him, and he gritted his teeth against the urge to banish the ghost, to send him back to his grave so that Will could scramble back over the fence and leave this place forever. Monty, as if seeing all that on Will’s face, only smiled, his teeth glinting under the moonlight peeping through the clouds. That smile was sadder than anything Will had ever seen.

“We weren’t careful enough,” he whispered then, and Will’s heart clenched in his chest against his will. “We were caught coming out of a tavern by two policemen. They imprisoned us in Newgate Prison for three weeks before they got around to hanging us both.”

He couldn’t help it—upon hearing those words Will’s eyes flit to Monty’s neck, willing himself to see the mark of the noose upon him. Monty only smiled wider, sadder, the dimples cutting into his cheeks.

“We were put to death, you see,” said the ghost, finishing his tale. “We were outcast, buried here for the sin of our love. Funny, isn’t it? That only God can judge us for our sins, but that humans still kill us for them?”

“Hilarious,” Will said. He’d scoured the rest of the plots in the yard, but just as Monty had said, there was no Percy to be found. He sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Do you have any clue where this Percy might be? An earthly possession he might be bound to?”

The ghost doesn’t even need to think, lighting up instantly. “His fiddle. Find his fiddle and you’ll find him.”

A fiddle. A hundred-year-old fiddle. Of course. “…Alright,” Will sighed. He marched himself to the gate and scaled it once again, setting down on the other side and glancing back. “Don’t expect a miracle.”

“Thank you,” the ghost whispered.

Will shook his head and walked away. It was going to be a long damn time before he found a fiddle in a haystack.

***

The search for the violin—or the fiddle, as it were—went on the back burner almost instantly, just as Will expected it to. The Clave had made it clear that all the members of the Institute were, first and foremost, required to submit themselves to the Inquisitor for interrogation pending resolution of the Mortmain incident. After his duties as a shadowhunter, Will’s responsibilities lay in doing whatever Magnus asked him to in order to remove the blasted curse that demon had put on him. Things like calling on Old Molly for the bones of an unborn child, as grotesque as that was.

Will grit his teeth, studiously ignoring the wide, faintly blue eyes that followed him through the entire transaction. “Have you started looking yet?” the ghost asked, as Will took the bones and shoved them into his bag.

“I haven’t the time just now,” Will responded, quickly brushing aside the other questions the ghost seemed intent to ask. “I’ll get to it soon. You’ve been dead a hundred years, you can stand to be patient a little longer.”

Monty’s ghostly shoulders drooped, and though Will felt a surge of guilt deep in his chest he didn’t take it back. He was willing to put the matter of the fiddle on the back burner forever, as far as he was concerned. At least… that was what he told himself. All the way up until he was out wandering late that night, foot in front of foot for kilometers upon kilometers, and found the massive fortress of the Newgate Prison looming from the darkness before him. Newgate Prison… and the gallows hidden behind its massive bulk. The gallows where, a hundred years past, two young men hardly more than boys were hung by the neck until dead for the sin of loving each other.

Will stopped at the entrance to the prison, staring up and up at the stone and mortar. He could imagine, despite himself, the terror of the impending noose. How scared they must have been… and then to have woken up again, no body and no pulse, each alone and separated from the other…

Will breathed out into the chill of the night. He wondered, for just a moment, if there was enough life essence in a noose’s knot for Tessa to Change into someone who had worn it. Then he reared back as if scalded, shaking his head. He couldn’t go thinking about Tessa. He needed to wipe her from his mind, scrape her from his heart. He crammed his hands into the pockets of his coat, intending to walk away, to go on just like that, putting the matter of the fiddle off forever, but… something inside him stopped him from doing that.

With the utmost disgust, he put his wandering to use, coming upon the headquarters of the Scotland Yard. He was still glamoured, so slipping inside was as easy as filling a cup of water in the Thames. The archives in the back were open to him the moment he scrawled an Open rune on the doors, and then he was inside, pawing through boxes and boxes of mildewed files from the last hundred years.

“If I were a file about a fiddle, where would I hide?” he asked, turning over a huge folder to get a look at the dates on it.

It took him half the night, but by the time Big Ben chimed three in the morning, he had the police file of Henry Montague and Percy Newton’s crimes in his hands.

***

The file didn’t go into much detail. It stated the date and time of the crime, described the altercation with the police (Percy fought back—Monty didn’t), and denoted the sentence for committing sodomy, which, at the time, was death. There was also a footnote about searching their shared flat, and… ah. It seemed as if all their belongings were stripped from the flat and sold to the local pawn shop. The police, Will was sure, pocketed the money. Good old Scotland Yard. Will rolled his eyes.

Still, it was a place to start. Will crawled his way through the Institute’s collection of maps that very night and found the pawn shop, which had been converted into a restaurant in the years since. The restaurant had a record book of the last few years that the pawn shop ran, all the way up until 1805—and there, in the inventory, were two violins, both noted as antiques. Will chose one at random and followed it from the pawn shop to a private collector to a mundane museum not far from the prison.

He was just suiting up to break into the museum when he found Jem in his doorway, a slight smile upon his lips. “Sorry,” he said. “I couldn’t sleep and I was just about to ask you if you wanted to take a walk with me.”

“Can’t,” Will said, “I’ve a date with a brothel to keep.”

“An entire brothel?”

“Yep. The ladies couldn’t decide who should go first, so of course I told them they didn’t have to choose if they didn’t want to.” He grinned, the smarmy grin that made Charlotte frown and Jessamine roll her eyes. Jem, on the other hand, only shook his head.

“I was hoping you could take a night off from that. You’ve been pushing yourself lately. No, don’t protest—I know it’s true. So please. Take a walk with me?”

Will dithered for a moment, biting his lip. “I… suppose I could put off my date for another night. There is something I need to do, though. Actually, now that I think about it, maybe you could help me.”

“Oh?”

Will nodded. Then he spouted a tale about being drunk and wandering into the cemetery and being accosted by a ghost. “Bloody thing was going to possess me, but I convinced it not to, on the condition that I find a friend of his. Some criminal by the name of Percy, haunting a violin.”

“And of course you said yes instead of banishing this poor ghost,” Jem said, his silver eyes alight with mirth.

“Well of course! I’m a very empathetic sort of person, you know—I couldn’t let this poor bastard go possessing people out of loneliness.”

Jem had crossed his arms, leaning in the doorway. Will couldn’t tell if he was buying the story or not. “I didn’t know you were in the business of doing favors for ghosts,” he said, finally, after a long moment.

Will let out a bark of a laugh. That was exactly what he was doing, wasn’t he? Blasted spirit, needling its way under his skin like that. Aloud he said, “What can I say? I’m a veritable favor factory, I help all in need.”

Jem laughed as well, a light noise that twisted up Will’s insides unexpectedly, and decidedly not because Jem often found amusement in Will’s obstinate nature. All this talk about ghosts… it only served to remind Will that Jem wouldn’t always be around to laugh like that. When the sickness got bad… when Jem could no longer function normally, even with the drug both keeping him alive and _eating_ him alive… when his time came… he would no longer be able to laugh like that. 

Will couldn’t shake the thought fast enough. He forced another laugh from his throat, probably too fast and too loud, but Jem didn’t comment on it. And besides, Jem was still alive, still cognizant, still _Jem_. For now, for however long it lasted, it was nice to have someone to laugh with. _Just this once_ , Will thought. And then he got on with the violin heist, Jem at his back, like always.

It was rather boring, as far as heists went. Their glamours assured that the night watchman would see and hear nothing, not the doors opening or their footsteps as they came upon the case holding the violin. _Over a hundred years old_ , the placard proclaimed— _in fantastic condition_. Will stared down at the violin, sitting neatly in its open case. Then, looking around, he set to work unlocking it from its sterile glass prison.

***

Will should have known that he wouldn’t be able to shake Jem once he had the violin in hand. Jem was something of a music aficionado, a great lover of music and especially strings. His own violin was tucked under his bed, safe and sound, always ready for Jem’s musical midnight urges. 

With a sigh, Will hauled their booty to Jem’s bed, resting it on the sheets. One clasp, two clasps, and the case was open—the violin rested on aged velvet, looking just as innocent as anything.

“Here, draw a Sight rune on me so I can help you with the ghost,” Jem said, raising his stele for Will to take. Will sighed, but acquiesced, drawing the lines of the rune on the back of Jem’s hand with quick swipes so he’d be able to see the ghost, too. If it was indeed the right fiddle.

Will set the stele aside, then eyed the fiddle. He reached forward to take it, almost nervous. “It’s probably the wrong blasted violin—” he said, and then closed his fingers around the neck, lifting it. He held it up at arms length, glancing wildly around.

Nothing. No one. No ghost or spirit or anything otherwise.

“Is anyone there?” Jem called softly, his silver hair gleaming in the moonlight. His eyes were wide, patient, waiting… but still, there was nothing.

“Well, back to the drawing board,” Will muttered. He dropped the violin back into its case and then, without bothering to move it from the bed, dropped himself down beside it. Jem’s hand flew out, steadying the instrument before it could fall. Will, ignorant of the look Jem was giving him, turned his face into the bedsheets and stifled as many curses as he could think up into them. He just wanted to be _done with this_.

There was a clack as Jem closed the case of the stolen violin. Then Jem hummed, and there was a shuffling noise. 

“…You know, I never did ask where Charlotte found this. It’s old—that’s all I know.”

Will lifted his head. Jem was holding his own violin, studying the slight dent in the side that had always been there. “Old, you say…” Will said. Jem nodded. Will grinned. Then he reached out to snatch up the violin.

“Please be gentle with that. It’s very precious to me,” said a voice, very _very_ close to Will’s ear.

Will started, and Jem blinked. “Bloody hell!” Will said, twisting around. He wasn’t expecting the damn ghost to appear so close to him, jesus. And yet, there it was. Standing just outside the light of the window, arms folded across its stomach and staring at them both with huge eyes. Another man, this one taller than Will by a good few inches, gangly and dark-skinned, though his skeleton still showed through his flesh.

Will swore again, pointing a finger at the damn thing. “Don’t scare me like that!”

The ghost blinked, raising one hand to point at his own chest. “You can hear me?” he asked. His voice was gentle, soft, nothing like Monty’s at all.

Will sniffed. “Of course I can! Jesus, do you go around scaring all the handsome young lads? How long have you been _in_ there?”

With a wry smile, the ghost lowered his hand. “A long, long time. No one has ever heard me before.”

Of course. Will turned his glare on Jem, who just shrugged. Will could have thrown his hands up in the air in exasperation. Half a decade, he’d had that damn thing, and not once had he mentioned that there was a dead man living in it. “And who, pray tell, _are_ you?” Will asked the dead man in question.

The ghost inclined his head. “Percy Newton, at your service.”

Will planted a hand on his face, dragging it down his cheeks. “You’re kidding me. I go searching this entire damn city for the one violin I need and it turns out it’s been right under my bloody nose the entire goddamn time?”

Jem laughed. The ghost smiled, apparently amused as well. “Why were you looking for my fiddle?” he asked.

“Because I know someone who wants to see you.”

The ghost—Percy, Will supposed, he should call him Percy—drifted closer for a moment. Will tensed, a banishment on his tongue, but Percy only raised one ghostly hand, stroking it across the surface of the violin case Jem was still holding. “Someone wants to see me?” he asked, his voice intentionally dull, all hope squashed down deep inside him where it couldn’t be heard.

Will nodded. “Yep. And he’s been a persistent _bastard_ about it. Also short. Handsome face, but his personality kind of ruins it—”

“Monty? You know where Monty is?” Percy demanded, his dark, ghostly eyes flicking over to scour Will’s face with such intensity that Will nearly turned around just to break the connection. Will nodded, swallowing hard.

And just like that, Percy’s face lit up, breaking into an absolutely brilliant smile.

***

They couldn’t head out to the cemetery that night—it was too close to dawn, and the dead couldn’t compete with direct sunlight. It had to be at night—the following night, Will promised, as Percy stared at him with wide, beseeching eyes. In the meantime, they had about eighteen hours to squander away. 

Will spent five of those hours lying in Jem’s bed, pretending to sleep. Jem was out the moment his head hit the pillow, exhausted from their night-time excursion. Percy, however, hovered anxiously at the side of the bed, as if he expected them to up and leave or, worse, burn the violin. The thought had crossed Will’s mind—there were ways to force a ghost to move on, and he could do the same to Monty. Just push them both off the precipice and into the nothingness that probably came beyond.

He’d decided, in the end, that it was too much work. Better to just deliver the violin and be done with it.

When Jem woke again, he blinked sleepily around the room. “Has he gone?” he asked.

“No, he’s right next to you,” Will said, gesturing.

“The Sight rune has worn off. Mind doing another?”

Will sighed, reaching for his stele. He swore, if they started nattering on about music or something equally stupid he was going to launch himself from Jem’s window and hope the fall killed him.

Which was exactly what they did. They were two peas in a pod, chatting amiably about music. Will groaned, kicking his boots up onto Jem’s pillow and pulling his hat down over his face. He endeavored to ignore the both of them until night came.

Only… he couldn’t. Not when Percy began to tell the story of his and Monty’s Tour, but from his own perspective—and he mentioned the fact that he was to be shipped off to an asylum at the end of it.

“Whatever for?” Will demanded, sitting up again. “Have you got a secret second personality that’s going to flip on us and attack?”

“No, nothing like that,” Percy sighed, his soft voice low. “I had… fits.”

“Fits of madness?” Will asked. “Fits of _murderous intent_?”

“No, not—fits as in seizures.”

The ghost shuffled uncomfortably where he was standing, meeting neither of their eyes. 

“Oh,” Will said. “Well that’s underwhelming. They’d send you to an asylum for that? Really?”

“It’s incurable. Or at least… it was. I don’t know what your medicine is like now. It was… not a death sentence, I wouldn’t be quite that dramatic, but it certainly wasn’t something you mentioned in polite company. You didn’t speak about it, and you prayed to god that no one found out. You kept it hidden, silenced yourself…”

Percy stared into the distance, his hands falling to his sides.

“Is he having a fit now? Can ghosts have fits?” Will stage-whispered to Jem.

Jem was already shaking his head. “Come on, Will, be kind.” He then raised his head, speaking to the ghost. “You’ve been through a lot. I’m sorry you had to go through that.”

Will scoffed, rolling his eyes. Jem, however, was completely sincere, and Percy seemed to understand that, if the way the tension in his shoulders relaxed. “Thank you,” he said, glancing back at Jem. “It might come as little consolation, but I’m sorry, as well.”

“We’ve all got our burdens,” Jem said mildly.

Will scoffed again, but this time it was to hide the thought of the curse that sprang to mind at those words. He couldn’t speak it aloud, not even to Jem, but sometimes he _desperately_ wanted to. Times like right here, right now.

He couldn’t, though. He couldn’t tell Jem about the curse, and he couldn’t save Jem from his fatal addiction, and he couldn’t even go and kick anything, either. He had to be content with biting his tongue, refraining from physical violence, and allowing Jem to ask permission to play the violin again.

“You’ve always been gentle with it. I trust you,” Percy said, giving said permission with a bow of his head.

And Jem was. He was so gentle with the instrument, tuning it carefully as Percy looked on with a longing in his eyes. Jem put bow to string and slowly came forward a stream of notes, sad and slow, filled with such an ache, such a longing, and Will had had so many emotions so close to the surface these past few weeks that he had to turn his head away and pretend to busy himself with a book on Jem’s bedside lest Jem spy the tears that began to escape.

The ghost saw. …Percy saw. But before Will could even glare at him, he did Will the courtesy of closing his eyes and turning away again.

***

The time came at midnight that night. They waited until Sophie and all the others had retired before sneaking from Jem’s room, violin in hand. They were silent during the walk to the cemetery, no one speaking. Percy was all but vibrating with a wild, nervous energy that had infected them all with a sense of deep seriousness. He wanted this so bad that Will could nearly taste it on his tongue.

The first view of the cemetery came as they rounded a corner off the main street, and with it came the usual moans and groans of the dead. Will squinted his eyes, looking for Monty among the masses of hazy energy. He couldn’t see him.

“Here, hold this,” he said, handing the violin to Jem. He then hauled himself up and over the fence, pausing at the top to take the violin again. Jem followed, and then it was it was Jem, Will, a fresh Sight rune, and a violin amid the ghosts, all clamoring for them.

“Back off,” Will snarled, raising his witchlight once again. “Out of my goddamn way.”

They shrank back, and Will proceeded into the rows of headstones, following his own footsteps back and back, to the place where the headstones had no names.

He felt it, the moment Percy spotted Monty, who was sitting squat on his own headstone. It was like the tingle of goosebumps, like a dousing of cold water, and then Percy was running, his long limbs ghosting through the air, leaving behind pale ribbons of energy. “Monty!” he called, and Monty looked up, and it was like the world shrank down to the two ghosts. Monty’s mouth gaped open, shock running through him, and then he, too, was running, and Percy was crying, and somewhere in the middle their arms wrapped around each other and Percy was swinging Monty around and around, leaving behind more ectoplasmic ribbons as they laughed, together, embracing each other. Percy set Monty back onto his feet and leaned over him, pressing kisses onto the shorter man’s cheeks with wild abandon.

“Thank you,” Monty said then, his voice wavering. “Thank you, thank you, thank you—”

“Stop thanking me,” Will grumbled, but the ghost couldn’t be stopped. Not until Percy tired of laying kisses on his cheeks and claimed, instead, his mouth. Will laughed aloud at the show, but it was as if the ghosts were on another plane of existence, lost amid themselves.

“They seem quite happy,” Jem said, and Will turned to find him with a small smile on his face.

Will could only shake his head.

***

It took a while, but eventually the two ghosts broke apart. They approached Will and Jem, their hands clasped, both smiling shy smiles and casting glances at each other like schoolgirls with crushes.

Will, seated on Monty’s headstone with his arms crossed over his chest, raised an eyebrow. “Finished already?” he asked. 

Monty wriggled his brows in response. “Trust me, we’d be more than happy to consummate our unholy union—”

“—Except for the fact that we are, indeed, dead,” Percy finished for him. “It’s hard to consummate anything when you’ve passed beyond your mortal body.”

“Shit. In that case, remind me to never die,” Will laughed. Jem snorted.

“We did, ah… we did have one more favor to ask,” Percy said. 

“Anything,” Jem promised. 

“ _Not_ anything,” Will said, narrowing his eyes. “If you’re going to have me chasing around another damn violin I want reimbursement. _Proper_ reimbursement. None of this ‘ _helping people gives you a floaty feeling inside_ ’ bullocks—”

Percy shook his head, the smile never leaving his face. “We just want Jem to play us one more song. If that’s all right?”

This question he directed at Jem, who was already nodding.

“If _that_ _’s_ all, then wake me when you’re done,” Will said. 

Jem ignored him, setting the violin case carefully on the ground so he could open it and pull the fiddle out. “Is there anything in particular you’d like to hear?” he asked, raising the violin to his shoulder.

The two ghosts shared a look. “Something happy,” Monty said, grinning. Percy nodded. And so Jem began to play again, a light tune, a happy one—one that Will recognized. He even knew the words, and despite himself he started to sing them under his breath as the ghosts took each others’ hands and started to dance, leaving swirls of ghostly light in their wake. A verse about love, a verse about freedom… the chorus, about joy. The wails of the ghosts all around them seemed to dim, to quiet, as Monty and Percy danced on and Jem’s bow flew across the strings and Will raised his voice until he was singing at the sky itself, the words flowing through him and out into the night. As he watched, Monty and Percy leaned together once again, still spinning, and shared one more slow kiss. 

Then, like a swarm of lightning bugs rising from a tree, the two ghosts seemed to come apart into a million little points of light. Their energy shone, so bright that Will had to cover his eyes. They had no form, but took up every inch of space in the little old cemetery. They were nothing, but they were everything. And then, just like that, they were gone, the energy dissipating into the very night itself. There was silence, ringing, as Jem lowered his bow, and Will knew that the ghosts had passed on, together, into whatever came after death.

***

Will was the first to break the silence.

“I hope they get to consummate their afterlife,” he said.

Jem sighed, though it wasn’t an exasperated noise. He sounded rather fond, actually. “You’ve got a very active imagination, Will,” he said.

“I resent that. I have an active lifestyle, too—it’s not just imagination.”

Jem didn’t respond to that, busy placing the violin back into its case. Will leaned over him, raising the witchlight to keep the ghosts back.

“Are you going to take that back to the Institute?” Will asked, gesturing to the violin case.

“I was planning to leave it here. Do you think I should take it?”

Will shrugged. “It doesn’t matter to me what you do. That ghost seemed to like it when you played, though.”

“So in that case I ought to keep it.”

A fake yawn crawled across Will’s tongue as he stood, turning real halfway through and bringing tears to his eyes. “Do whatever you like. I’m going home to bed,” he said.

***

And he did. That’s where he is now. At the Institute, in his bed, huddled up in a bundle of blankets. He never said he would sleep once he was there, now did he?

He sighs, staring up into the great, vast depths of the stars just outside his window. He is sure of _so many things in this life_. That Jem is dying, that the curse will kill Tessa if he lets her get any closer, that he’s going to be alone all his life if Magnus can’t do anything about the demon who cursed him in the first place. He’s sure that somewhere, out in the vast universe, there are two beings who loved each other so much that not even death could stop them. And he’s sure that he’ll remember this night for the rest of his life. Because even after their love cost them everything… after they were killed for the sin of loving each other… even after all of that, they could be reunited again, and pass on together. 

Will breathes deeply, staring out at the night sky. He just hopes that someday he’ll be able to say the same for himself.

**Author's Note:**

> EDIT: I just learned that Jem's violin came with him from Shanghai so this verse is no longer canon-compliant. Rip. Still, it's a fun idea!
> 
> Shadowhunter terminology:
> 
> Shadowhunter, aka Nephilim: a human with angel's blood. Stronger, faster, and more agile than normal humans, shadowhunters basically uphold the law of the supernatural world.
> 
> The Clave: shadowhunter authority. It's like their government. The Inquisitor is part of the Clave.
> 
> Glamour: just like a fae glamour, this is a magical spell that disguises someone. They are often used to make shadowhunters invisible.
> 
> Stele: a special writing utensil that shadowhunters use. It can write runes on just about anything, but most importantly it can write them onto (into) skin.
> 
> The Institute: Will and Jem's home, but also a sort of shadowhunter headquarters. Run by Charlotte. Jessamine, Tessa, and a few others also live at the institute.
> 
> Old Molly and the significance of wedding rings: Old Molly is a ghost who trades in illicit materials. She asks for wedding rings in return because she is in search of the tether that keeps her bound to the earth, so that she may someday move on.
> 
> Magnus Bane: he's a warlock with cat eyes. All warlocks have one inhuman feature, plus some sort of magical ability. He's helping Will undo the curse put on him.
> 
> Jem and the drugs: Jem is dying because of an addiction to a demon's venom(?). He cannot be weaned off of it, because then he would die faster. It's very tragic.
> 
> Witchlight: a magical light.
> 
> The Mortmain incident: SPOILERS FOR THE FIRST TID BOOK: Mortmain is the big bad who disappears at the end of the first book after wreaking havoc on the Institute. They're all in trouble because of it.
> 
> De Quincy: former head of a vampire clan.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [The Other Side of the Noose](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21898453) by [pinstripedJackalope](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pinstripedJackalope/pseuds/pinstripedJackalope)




End file.
